


No End of War

by Just_Another_Day



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Canonical Character Death, Gen, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-16
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2019-05-24 05:28:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14948430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Just_Another_Day/pseuds/Just_Another_Day
Summary: They live with the dead every day, in more ways than one. But together they survive.





	No End of War

**Author's Note:**

> So the procrastination is apparently still going strong as a driving force for writing fic. What is wrong with me?
> 
> Speaking of what is wrong with me: Why do I keep writing really random modern AUs lately? I don't know. Why did zombies suddenly come to my mind at all when I wasn't doing/watching/thinking anything I could even vaguely link back to zombies? I don't know. And why did I then decide that, hey, zombies and Capri would go together well? I _really_ don't know. But here is the result of that nonetheless. This is a one-shot for now. I don't really know whether I want to write more. 
> 
> FYI, the rating is for some brief but somewhat gory descriptions, in line with what you'd expect of a story featuring zombies. The rating is most definitely not for sexual content, because Laurent is 16/17 in the different parts of this fic, and it's very much pre-romantic-relationship, though I think it's pretty heavily implied that their relationship may shift in the not-too-distant future.
> 
> The title's a reference to the quote 'only the dead have seen the end of war'.

Damen awoke to the spine-chilling sound of rattling breathing, too loud and therefore too close for comfort. He listened for a minute, and then another, but there was no change. It seemed that the source of the noise wasn't just wandering through, as they sometimes did, but rather was hanging around outside the building for some reason. That wasn't good. That was _never_ good. 

He could only hear one, but that didn't fool him into complacency. They tended to attract each other somehow, whether by noise or smell or, hell, some kind of weird remnant of socialisation, for all he knew. Whatever the cause, where one appeared, others usually soon followed. So if one was this close, and didn't seem to be moving away from them, it was probably a good sign that they'd overstayed their welcome in this particular building. 

Though he would have expected Laurent to wake him to let him know as much long before the noise grew loud enough to wake Damen instead. 

He realised why that hadn't happened when he finally shifted a modicum of attention from the looming danger and noted the heavy weight on his chest and the tickle of hair against his collarbone. 

Despite knowing he should wake him immediately, Damen took a few seconds to admire the sight of Laurent's face pressed close against him, relaxed in rest. Damen so rarely saw Laurent asleep. He'd half convinced himself that the boy had somehow forced himself to evolve not to require such things. Apparently it had to catch up to him eventually, though, and the easy proximity of a warm 'pillow' must have been a siren call too tempting to ignore. Even so, Damen doubted that Laurent had given in to sleep willingly; surely he would at least have woken Damen to have him take over the watch if that had been the case. Laurent wasn't naïve enough to leave them unguarded on purpose. Not anymore.

Though it was a pity to wake him, Damen had no choice. Better to disturb his much-needed rest and the soft tableau he presented than to wait too long and risk losing more than a little sleep.

Damen pressed his fingertips gently to Laurent's lips before shaking at his shoulder lightly. Almost as soon as Laurent's eyes opened, they turned apologetic, presumably as he realised that he'd failed to keep a proper watch. Damen did his best to send him a forgiving look. Laurent always claimed Damen's expressions were too open and easily readable, so hopefully he managed to silently convey his thoughts well enough.

Even in those first barely-aware moments of surfacing consciousness, Laurent also seemed to recognise what the touch on his lips – the signal to be quiet – actually meant. He made no sound. He turned his head slightly, clearly listening, and seemed after a few moments to pick up on what Damen had heard. He nodded wordlessly to indicate that he understood the situation they were in. Damen let his fingers fall away from their point of contact as Laurent rose carefully to his feet.

As the smaller of the two of them, Laurent tended to be much lighter on his feet, and therefore was less likely to make enough noise to attract outside attention and bring their unwanted guest crashing through one of the windows. As such, he was the one who darted across the room, careful to remain low enough that his movement wouldn't be visible through the crack in the curtains, and then made his way up the staircase. Damen's chest clenched the moment Laurent disappeared from sight, but he knew there was no reason to be worried. They'd cleared this building meticulously before setting up here, and there was no way anything could have reached the upper floors without entering at the ground level. Damen could see all of the windows and both doors from his current position. They were all secure for now. So despite being momentarily alone, Laurent was safe. Now if only Damen's racing heart would get that message.

It took less than a minute for Laurent to reappear from upstairs, where he'd gotten a better viewpoint to survey the yard. Laurent held up two fingers and then pointed towards the front of the building. At this stage, there were already two people in the yard. Or rather, two _things_ , for Damen knew all too well that they were no longer 'people'.

* * *

Laurent hadn't always wanted to accept that distinction between 'person' and 'thing' as truth, and he'd made no secret of it. When Damen had first seen him after everything had gone utterly to hell, and had fallen upon him and his brother with exhausted relief, Laurent had been referring to _them_ as 'the sick'. Damen had shared a look with Auguste at the time. He'd noted from Auguste's expression that he seemed to agree with Damen that the things that now roamed the streets weren't just people suffering from some illness that was serious but presumably curable, if only someone could figure out what the cure actually _was_. Laurent, on the other hand, believed in science and logic above all, and there was no convincing him that things had escalated far beyond what science and logic could rightly explain. The people out there were _obviously_ only sick, Laurent said, because dead people simply did not get up and walk around again.

Laurent had eventually shouted his disbelief in Damen's face, unheeding of the attention the noise drew. Damen had tried to quiet him, to explain, to make him understand, but there had been no reasoning with him for quite some time. All Laurent could see, no matter what Damen said, was that the first time Laurent had ever seen Damen kill, his 'victim' had worn the face of Laurent's brother, even if that face had been frothing at the mouth and punctuated by maddened and hungry eyes that in no way resembled the way Auguste had looked at either of them in life.

"He was your friend!" Laurent had screamed.

"He was," Damen had agreed, "right up until the moment he stopped breathing. Then he became something else entirely. I'm sorry, but that's how it is now. That's how it _has_ to be, if you want to stay alive. You're my friend too, and I wasn't about to let a walking corpse eat you just because of some sense of nostalgia for a dead man."

Laurent punched him in the jaw. Damen made no move to stop him. The hit wasn't that hard. Probably not as hard as he deserved. 

"He would never have done such a thing. Don't speak of him that way," Laurent said. "You _killed_ him. You don't get to sully his memory as well." His voice was dangerous, like he was on the edge of something. Damen was scared to know what that something might be, so he didn't push any further. He was already worried that Laurent would insist on getting away from him; the last thing he wanted was to do anything more to force the boy away. 

Laurent would have to deal with what had really happened eventually, but obviously Damen had been trying for too much too fast in his desperation to stop Laurent from fleeing from his side. After all, Laurent hadn't seen the-thing-that-had-been-Auguste's face like Damen had. He'd only seen Damen stop the thing in its tracks, decisively. Damen really wished he hadn't seen that part.

Laurent did try to leave a few times, but Damen got the feeling they were half-hearted efforts, for Damen didn't actually have to put that much effort into pursuing him. He might have hated Damen right then, but Damen was also all he had now. If Laurent left, he would have no one to watch his back, and nothing but total isolation to look forward to. Laurent seemed unsure whether that would be preferable to spending time with his brother's supposed killer. And as long as Laurent wasn't open to listening to the facts, Damen could do nothing to convince him that he was the better of the options.

In the end, though, it hadn't really come down to Damen convincing Laurent at all. It came down to watching a woman – who had just been screaming while her insides were turned into a snack, right up until the moment that she finally went quiet and still, shock or blood loss finally providing her some mercy – get right back up and start shuffling around, searching, as if the gaping wound in her abdomen didn't exist. Laurent had never seen one of them actually come back before that; Auguste had shielded him from the worst of what was out there for as long as he could. Laurent had never been in a position to see the ones with truly horrific mortal wounds or advanced decay, either, for Auguste did the supply runs for both of them right up until Damen found them, and then Damen and Auguste had always taken turns, leaving the other with Laurent. Damen and Auguste had agreed on most things, but one thing in particular had never been in contention between them: no matter what, protecting Laurent was a priority. Perhaps they'd protected him too well, in the end, for he'd been sheltered from the reality of the situation. Of course someone like Laurent, who trusted in science, needed to see the evidence in all its gory detail in order to believe. 

Laurent watched with wide eyes as the clearly-freshly-dead woman hauled her body towards the two of them, joined by the less-fresh corpse that had just been eating her. Laurent still watched, motionless, as Damen put both of the bodies down with swift blows to the head.

Damen had then grabbed Laurent's arm, pulling him away. Laurent hadn't put up any purposeful resistance, but neither had he actually gotten his feet properly under him and run of his own volition. He'd just let Damen drag him, stumbling along after him. He'd been in shock, clearly. Almost everything in Damen had wanted to let him just have some time to sit and work through what he'd just seen, and what he seemed to finally be acknowledging, rather than making him race across the deserted neighbourhood while he was still in shock like that. But by then Damen had developed a well-honed instinct for prioritising safety over everything else, so stopping hadn't been an option until he found them a new place that was both secure and easy to escape from at a moment's notice, and that had no walking bodies nearby.

When Damen had found such a place, he'd gently pressed Laurent onto a slightly-dusty couch while he'd made sure they were entirely alone in the house and that the whole place was locked up tight. Then he'd returned to Laurent's side. He didn't touch him, but he remained close enough to make it obvious that he was there for Laurent, if he needed him (and it was fairly obvious that he was going to need him).

"It was just a stupid _scratch_ ," Laurent said. His voice was small and shaking. It was almost child-like, for all that he usually sounded far more mature than his sixteen years. "How could something like that have killed him? How… how could I have let him become something like _that_?"

Damen said softly, cautiously, "I'm not sure I'll ever get to know how exactly it all works. I just know that once they scratch or bite you, it's just a matter of time. There's nothing you could have done to stop him from being scratched, and there was nothing you could do for him after that. I did the only thing either of us could do for him. I've seen their eyes, after. I saw _his_ eyes. There's nothing of the people they once were left. Auguste wouldn't have wanted to continue on like that."

Laurent made a noise that was half-sob and half-laughter. "So you couldn't have killed Auguste, because he was already dead," he said. It was as if he considering a strange new idea for the first time, even though Damen had tried to make him understand exactly that after it happened. Perhaps, more to the point, it was the first time he was _willing_ to consider the idea.

Damen considered averting his eyes from the sight of Laurent's tears, for Laurent would undoubtedly see them as a weakness, and would probably hate for Damen to see him at a 'low' point. However, Damen couldn't bring himself to do it, because doing so would suggest that _he_ thought of Laurent's show of sadness as a weakness, and that couldn't be further from the truth. Damen had cried more than once since this all started. The people who he'd cried for deserved his tears, and he wouldn't deny them that. He didn't think Laurent should either. Laurent should cry for Auguste, and for himself.

Still, weakness or not, Damen had long since resolved that he didn't ever want to cry for Laurent that way. So it was a relief, to say the least, when Laurent had finally started showing signs that he might, after all, be willing to remain at Damen's side voluntarily, rather than just because he couldn't easily seem to outrun Damen. That was all Damen wanted: Laurent at his side, where Damen could keep him safe. 

The morning after his breakdown, Laurent had woken from a deep sleep, prompted by his emotional exhaustion, showing no more signs of mourning. There was only determination. 

"Teach me how to use your weapons," Laurent had demanded.

* * *

Now, many months later, Laurent had become proficient in quite a few things that he hadn't really experienced while his brother had been there to shelter him, weapons included. And even though Damen still had every intention of prioritising Laurent's safety, and couldn't imagine that changing any time soon, he also now trusted Laurent to watch his back in turn. It was more of an equal partnership than he had ever imagined it could be. 

It was, in fact, more like what he and Auguste had shared for the short time between when Damen had found them and when Auguste had been injured, and then changed. The thought of that still ignited a burning pain in Damen's chest.

The point, Damen thought to himself to push away that thought, was that Laurent was certainly capable enough now to help him strategise their next move well before they had to make it, and to execute it with him when the time came, rather than to just be pulled along at his heels.

They never stopped off anywhere without at least two doors facing in different directions. So once they'd gathered their supplies, the two of them were able to silently slip out the side of the building that was opposite to where one of the corpses was currently scraping along the wall, with the other stumbling around nearby. 

Damen had long since taken to sizing up alternatives along the way whenever they went on supply runs, and they had been lucky enough to spend a decent amount of time in this quiet town without any migrating pack of the dead sweeping through and driving them away, as had happened to him before. As such, Damen already had in mind a place three streets over that would likely suit their needs, and which was close enough that they wouldn't have to be outdoors for too long in the dark.

Damen hated moving of a night, because that was when the dead things tended to be more active. They also seemed to respond mainly to noise and smell, so the cover of darkness was no real cover at all. If anything, it only disadvantaged Damen and Laurent, because _they_ , at least, relied on the ability to spot the corpses from a distance. 

But it was still better to move now, when there were only two of them to avoid – along with any strays that might be wandering the path between their old abode and their new location – than to wait until the dead all started amassing together. The more there were around, the harder it was to find a way to get out without drawing the attention of the dead and making them give chase. Damen recalled in vivid detail the one time when they'd had to cling to windowsills and climb over the tops of houses to avoid the dozens of bodies seething on the ground. It hadn't been the most pleasant of experiences. At least, as far as Damen was concerned; on the other hand, he'd seen a strange intensity in Laurent's eyes as he gripped Damen's hand and took a running leap to the next rooftop, as if he were enjoying the challenge. Damen hadn't been sure at the time whether to be glad for that bright spark of positive emotion, or to be worried that Laurent would start going out of his way to take risks like that just for the thrill of it. So far he hadn't seemed to do so, but Damen supposed only time would tell. 

Tonight, at least, Laurent seemed willing to play it careful. They moved nearly soundlessly, attracting no attention. For once, it went off without a hitch. They weren't always that lucky. Though they were more careful now, since… Since. There would be no more losses. They only had each other left, now, after all.

The house they had chosen was single-story, but if they found themselves surrounded on the ground floor, it did have manholes in the ceiling, and once they got up in the gap between that and the roof, Damen didn't doubt he could pry a few roof tiles off from the inside so they could climb out onto the roof, if it came to that (and only if it _had_ to come to that; Damen didn't intend to encourage Laurent to take that route). 

It was also empty. Most of the houses in this neighbourhood were, from what they'd experienced. They'd only stumbled upon one house that was already being used, and they'd been lucky enough that the couple staying there had been too unused to actually using their weapons to immediately fire on them as soon they heard them coming. They had also been decent enough people to not try to fire once they realised that Damen and Laurent were living, and had no intention of hurting them. Not everyone could be counted on to be so reasonable, Damen knew. He'd been lucky since meeting up with Laurent (and Auguste), but back when he'd been further south with Nikandros, they'd run into their fair share of people who, under these circumstances, seemed to prescribe to a 'survival of the fittest' mode of thought. Damen liked to think that he _was_ one of the 'fittest' in the traditional sense, but nowadays that idea tended to go hand-in-hand with being the most ruthless, which Damen certainly was not. 

He had, since then, resolved to be more careful about scoping out potential dwellings, and about making their initial entry more carefully, being more aware of even the slightest signs of current occupancy. Damen insisted on these things, and other preventative measures, because he suspected those kinds of things might one day save their lives as surely as a shotgun could. That was why the first thing they did once they'd arrived at the new spot was to check every possible corner and every port of entry to make sure that the place had no corpses or living individuals already inside, and that none could get inside without making a hell of a ruckus and, hopefully, giving them enough notice to put the dead down and get out of there before more arrived. 

When they were done with those checks, Damen started to settle in a little, dragging the mattress out into the area with the most useful 360 degree vantage while still maintaining a safe distance from all the windows, as well as finding a spot for their supplies, and even checking the cupboards for food or other supplies.

"Do you think it'll be time to move to another town soon?" Laurent asked, watching him.

Damen shrugged. "I think there's still at least one more well-stocked store we haven't hit, not to mention that there could be canned goods and the like inside the houses that we haven't looked into. And there's not a lot of other people drawing on those resources here, from what I can tell. We could stay here for a while yet, unless something particular happens to make us leave. Why? Are you suddenly keen to get away from here for some reason?"

Damen could understand wanting to get away, if they'd had any particularly close calls here, or even more so if this had been the town that Auguste had died in. But that had been several towns and a good hundred miles or so back, and despite having to change houses regularly, they'd never really come close to having to run for their lives in the few months they'd spent here.

Staring out the window, as if he could actually see much in the darkness, Laurent said, "Maybe I am. It's strange. I always used to be happy staying in one place, as long as I had my books to keep me entertained and busy."

"I remember," Damen said fondly. Before the outbreak, or whatever it was that had ultimately caused the current status quo, Damen had rarely seen Laurent without his nose buried in a book. He was frankly surprised Laurent had looked away from those pages for long enough to even see Damen's face well enough to recognise it when they'd coincidentally crossed paths three months into their now-nomadic lifestyles.

"But now," Laurent continued, "I find myself thinking there must be more out there than just this. There has to be, surely. If nothing else, shouldn't there be more people alive and around, if there are only this many dead wandering the streets? There might be some kind of civilisation putting itself back together out there somewhere, for all we know. And how will we know unless we go looking for it?"

That was true, to a point. It was also true that it sounded a lot like going and looking for trouble. Looking for other people was all well and good, if the people were of a reasonable nature. But not everywhere was as quiet and relatively (everything was relative these days) safe as this town they'd found. Some parts of the country now bore a striking resemblance to the Wild West, or so Damen had heard. And he'd seen for himself that the people who'd survived this long were often willing to do absolutely anything to ensure that survival.

It was strange. Damen wasn't used to being a glass-half-empty kind of guy. And, by contrast, Laurent had never struck Damen as overly optimistic before, either. But Damen supposed that living like this changed a person's perspective. Laurent would probably say that Damen's slowly decreasing reliance on blindly trusting people could only be a good thing. And if Laurent chose, as his method of coping, to believe that whatever change they might find out there was more likely to be something worth seeking out than something too dangerous to risk, well, Damen supposed that there were worse ways he could be dealing with all this. 

"We can go somewhere else if you like," Damen agreed. He thought he would probably agree to most anything that Laurent asked, unless it would put them in unreasonable danger.

"Mmm," Laurent said hazily, betraying the fact that he was apparently still tired. "Not just yet. But soon."

"Go to sleep, Laurent. I'll take watch this time," Damen announced.

"You're not going to let me live down the fact that I fell asleep when I was supposed to be on watch, are you?" Lauren huffed.

"It's not that. It's just that you're obviously tired, and I've already slept for five full hours. Besides, I'm still keyed up, so I couldn't sleep anyway, and someone might as well."

Laurent's expression was highly put-upon, but Damen could tell it was at least partly an act. "Whatever. It just means I'll take watch for the whole night tomorrow, so it'll even out anyway."

"Of course," Damen agreed readily, though he had every intention of trying to talk Laurent into sleeping for a reasonable amount of time tomorrow, just as he did every night. If nothing else, it had become one of their traditions.

Laurent unfortunately didn't fall asleep on Damen's chest again – Damen hardly expected him to when it was a conscious decision – but he did drift off pressed tight against Damen's side, muttering as he closed his eyes that he was cold, and Damen's size seemed to make him a somewhat suitable human substitute for a heater. Damen gazed down at Laurent for a long while, noting when the rise and fall of his chest slowed a little, evening out as sleep claimed him. It was the only breathing he heard for the remainder of the night, and that fact made Damen feel strangely safe.

And if Damen circled an arm around Laurent to keep him extra warm (or to keep him close), then Laurent didn't need to know.


End file.
